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In Chains For Jesus. Cardinal Swiatek´s Prison Diaries

The archbishop of Minsk recounts his years spent in Soviet gulags. "The West knew about us, yet didn´t intervene. And we felt abandoned and defenseless"

by Sandro Magister

ROMA - Kazimierz Swiatek is a venerable old man, nearly 90 years old, archbishop off Minsk-Mohilev in Belarus and cardinal since 1994. No one knew much about him. His biography was practically unknown. So it used to be. That is, until a few days ago, when his amazing life story appeared in the Italian bishops conference daily newspaper, "Avvenire".

Cardinale Swiatek spoke about his life - about the years least known to us - while addressing an assembly of Catholics from the former Soviet Union attending a conference in Kiev. "Avvenire" correspondent, Luigi Geninazzi, was there and recorded his story in the newspaper´s Nov. 11 issue.

In the story Swiatek informs us of his time spent in prison followed by years in special correctional facilities: two years in the Marinsk gulag, seven in the Vorkuta artic circle mines and while his last were spent in the Siberian tundra region. And then recalls his homecoming to land of destroyed churches and yet indomitable faithful - just like him, rock solid and resistant to any wave of persecution.

By making him cardinal in 1994, Karol Wojtyla made a gesture of great significance: The Church of the martyrs is not only made up of saints in heaven, but of men of tremendous valor here on earth. They are those species of men and women hailing from regions that the rest of the world - even Catholics - regard with indifference. Besides Swiatek, there was another Wojtylian cardinal from the same background: Vietnamese bishop of Saigon, Nguyen Van Thuan, who spent thirteen years in incarceration following the "liberation" of his country. He died in 2002 while in exile in Rome. Even his biography echoes the writings of Solgenitsin and the acts of the first Christian martyrs.

John Paul II has beatified twenty martyrs from Belarus, all killed during the Nazi occupation of 1941-43. Eleven of them - all nuns - rose up to offer their lives in exchange for the liberation of some hundred Catholics made prisoners. They were shot.

Then the came the years under the enemy-fire of Stalin and his successors. And there were the years of antireligious oppression - incessant even after the fall of the Berlin Wall followed by the return of Belarus as an independent state, as documented in reports made by the Aid to the Suffering Church and Keston Institute.

Cardinal Swiatek bears witness to all of this. Below he tells his story:

My Long Winter in Stalin´s Gulags

by Kazimierz Swiatek

In the times of Stalin, the Soviet Union was nothing but a huge gulag - an endless enclosure of barbed wire where thousands of prisoners died of the inhumane conditions of the life and work imposed upon them inside these labor camps.

After having served twice in Soviet prisons and two months on death row, I ended up being sent to a special hard labor camp. First in the Siberian subartic taiga region, and then in the tundra of the far north. I was held in extreme isolation, which kept me from coming into contact with other priests and hearing confessions. It was only during my last years inside the gulag that I managed to obtain hosts and wine to celebrate holy mass in secrecy: I used a ceramic cup as a chalice and kept in a match box consecrated hosts to be brought to Catholic detainees. I remember well the Easter mass held with Catholic prisoners among clouds of steam inside a laundry room. In my whole life as a priest, this is the Easter I recall most dearly.

* * *

Once, in the Vorkuta gulag, I organized a Christmas vigil mass. I brought with me my two daily rations of bread, which I had put aside the days beforehand. The other prisoners (about ten or so) offered what they had received in food packages from their families. We even had hosts. As I was speaking to those in attendance, the door flew open. With riot-stick in hand, a government official rushed in with a soldier bearing a riffle and bayonet. "What are you doing?", he asked. I stood up and explained that we were celebrating the Christmas rite. Then, while holding the host, I asked if he wanted to receive it, too, so as to exchange Christmas greetings with us. It was a very unusual and tense situation: both our hands were held tight - his clutching a riot-stick and while mine held firmly onto the host. The officer put down the club in his possession, excusing himself for not being able to receive the host while on duty, and allowed us to continue our vigil service. He left the room with the soldier. The next morning, however, I was expelled from Vorkuta and sent to the far-off tundra region to the north.

* * *

For ten years I remained completely isolated from all reality, particularly from the reality of Belarus and its Church, where all believers in God and those attempting to attend religious services were persecuted with Satanic ferocity. And those who persevered in their faith, despite such terrible persecutions, felt abandoned and defenseless.

The West, despite knowing Church´s situation in the Soviet Union, did not intervene in defense of believers oppressed and persecuted by the regime - perhaps influenced by certain reasons of its own or political motives. And yet the Church in Belarus, even when lacking ecclesiastical structures, suffering and even bleeding at times, remained alive and active.

* * *

And then came my last day as a gulag prisoner. I was escorted to the KGB office outside the camp. The chief commander was seated behind his desk as I stood in front of him with my back to the wall. The officer examined a voluminous pile of paperwork documenting my days as a prisoner. Now and again he glanced up at me, scrutinizing me with astounded expression. Having reached the last page, he asked: "How on earth have you been able to bear it all and still be alive?". He couldn´t understand it. Yet the rules of the KGB were simple and univocal: for someone like me, there was no need to waste a bullet. The rules alone were enough to relieve me of the superhuman fatigue and conditions of the gulags. And to his great astonishment.

I answered: "Commander, I owe my life to my unshakeable faith in God. It was He who saved me." He said: "But, God exists"? He sat there a long time in deep thought. It was this very man whose decision decided my fate. I stood there with my back to the wall, praying for God´s help to save my life. Upon deep reflection, the commander looked at me with an air of benevolence (the first time I had ever witnessed a KGB officer act in such I away in my case). He then took pen in hand, and with a sweeping gesture, signed for my release. Afterward, he simply and gently said: "You are free to go." I left his office unescorted, and I was free! I immediately offered up a prayer of thanksgiving: God, you are so powerful, so good!

* * *

And so in 1954, after ten years in the gulags, I returned to Pinsk. I entered the cathedral there, where during my 1939 ordination ceremony, I vowed faith and obedience to God. It was that very vow that would comprise my entire future.

It was Sunday in the cathedral. In the first rows, there were thirty or so elderly women. I was leaning against a column. At the altar was a small elderly man hobbling about while busily, but strangely preparing it for holy mass. He set the chasuble and chalice upon the altar, lit the candles and rang the sacristy´s bell... but there was no priest to be seen behind the altar. The women stood up. And one of them, while making the sign of the cross, announced in a loud voice which particular Sunday it was and, along with the other women, began reciting the mass´s introductory prayers. Hence, it was a priest-less mass! I burst into tears. How was it possible, I said to myself, that there was a priest here leaning against a column, "in incognito," and yet someone else is reading the Gospel!

At the conclusion of this extraordinary mass, I went into the sacristy to speak with the little old man. It turned out that six years ago the cathedral´s parish priest was arrested and condemned to 25 years in prison. I asked if they wanted a priest. "Yes," he responded, but they didn´t know where to find one. I then said that I was a priest and had just been freed from a Soviet gulag. This is how I began my service as pastor of souls. I started the official paperwork with the authorities in order to be registered as the cathedral´s parish priest. From that point on, I was time and again stopped in the street, asked to get in a car and brought to KGB headquarters, where I was detained until the early morning hours. They tried to convince me to abandon the priesthood, promising advantageous new conditions in exchange. To my categorical refusals, they responded by threatening to have me thrown back in prison. After five months, they finally gave up trying and granted me permission to carry out my duties as the Pinsk parish priest.

* * *

The parish covered the vast territory between the Bug River to the Pacific Ocean. Often the cathedral was visited by faithful coming from thousands of kilometers away from Pinsk. In the country towns and villages, the faithful gathered together to celebrate mass in homes behind closed-shutters. In the evenings, too, they gathered in cemeteries to sing religious hymns, keeping their voices down so as not to be heard in the local district administration offices. Often they recited the rosary on beads of bread crumbs.

I have always held that a woman´s witness to her faith is one of the most precious things in life. It is the proverbial "babushke" women who managed to preserve faith in God during the years of persecution, when there were neither churches nor priests to be found. We must be grateful to them for the faith which has not disappeared forever from these heavily oppressed lands. It is these women to whom we owe gratitude for teaching at least the Our Father and Hail Mary to their grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Even if they haven´t paid for the faith with their blood, their lives still bear the signs of martyrdom. They are heroic figures, even if a monument to their names will never be erected. Honor and glory to you, dear ladies, beloved babushke of gold!

* * *

Since 1991, after having been made archbishop, I began traveling about the vast territory of Belarus - sometimes over one thousand kilometers a day - while discovering countless witnesses to faith.

In one parish a young priest from Poland came to meet me. The church was a half-destroyed building, having no roof or doors. In front of its facade was a group of about twenty women. They came running up to me, and to my amazement, they threw themselves down at my feet. I was shocked: For the first time in their lives, they had met a Catholic bishop in front of their destroyed church. Then, they returned to where they were before and in trembling voices sang a Marian hymn. How could I, a bishop, refrain from tears while witnessing such faith in God and the Church. I then asked the young priest what in God´s name led him to abandon homeland for such a desolate place? His answer was: : "Father, you might say I´ve gone crazy for God." I then embraced and a kissed him, while whispering in his ear: "Alright then, dear father, may you go completely crazy!" And he did! He has already raised three churches from the ruins that I myself wasn´t even able to reconsecrate.

In the meantime, we have seen the fall of the Soviet Union and the birth of the independent republic of Belarus. During a special audience to pilgrims hailing from Belarus, the Holy Father paid homage to all those who, at the price of countless suffering and even martyrdom, were able to preserve the very dignity of believers. Oh how John Paul II´s memory has redeemed us! Old and new centers of worship are filled with the faithful, among whom are ever more children and young people actively participating in catechism. I give infinite thanks to God, as he has given me the grace to survive years of persecution and to still be a active witness to the liberation, rebirth and development of the Church in Belarus.

__________

The link to the Italian bishops conference daily newspaper in which the text appeared reproduced Nov. 11 2003: